Why you shouldn’t publically correct other people’s grammar

No one likes to have their grammar, spelling and typos corrected in public – as can often happen in blog comments, not only because it’s unpleasant and smug, but because it will inevitably come back to bite the ‘advisor’. This is true, even if you’re a politician in charge of education, like Michael Gove, who, in spectacular smugness had this little exchange:

Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab): Is the Secretary of State aware that figures from his department show that academy schools are, on average, teaching one third less GCSEs in history and geography than schools in the maintained sector, and are often inflating their grades through the use of GCSE equivalents?

Michael Gove: Like the hon. Gentleman, I am committed to academic excellence, so I should point out that he should have said “fewer”, not “less”.

How unfortunate then for his letter announcing changes to a school programme to include:

“I look forwards [sic] to the number of schools enjoying these and other Academy freedoms increasing.”

…

“I have decided that from April 2011 funding for specialism should no longer take the form of a dedicated grant, so that all schools can to decide [sic] how to develop their specialisms in the light of the total resources available to them.”

Now there’s a lesson we can all learn! (via Political Scrapbook be sure to check out the video of the repartee there!)